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Limit Password Reuse: password-auth

An XCCDF Rule

Description

Do not allow users to reuse recent passwords. This can be accomplished by using the remember option for the pam_pwhistory PAM module.

On systems with newer versions of authselect, the pam_pwhistory PAM module can be enabled via authselect feature:

authselect enable-feature with-pwhistory
Otherwise, it should be enabled using an authselect custom profile.

Newer systems also have the /etc/security/pwhistory.conf file for setting pam_pwhistory module options. This file should be used whenever available. Otherwise, the pam_pwhistory module options can be set in PAM files.

The value for remember option must be equal or greater than

warning alert: Warning

If the system relies on authselect tool to manage PAM settings, the remediation will also use authselect tool. However, if any manual modification was made in PAM files, the authselect integrity check will fail and the remediation will be aborted in order to preserve intentional changes. In this case, an informative message will be shown in the remediation report.

warning alert: Warning

Newer versions of authselect contain an authselect feature to easily and properly enable pam_pwhistory.so module. If this feature is not yet available in your system, an authselect custom profile must be used to avoid integrity issues in PAM files. If a custom profile was created and used in the system before this authselect feature was available, the new feature can't be used with this custom profile and the remediation will fail. In this case, the custom profile should be recreated or manually updated.

Rationale

Preventing re-use of previous passwords helps ensure that a compromised password is not re-used by a user.

ID
xccdf_org.ssgproject.content_rule_accounts_password_pam_pwhistory_remember_password_auth
Severity
Medium
References
Updated



Remediation - Ansible

- name: Gather the package facts
  package_facts:
    manager: auto
  tags:
  - CCE-86354-8
  - CJIS-5.6.2.1.1

Remediation - Shell Script

# Remediation is applicable only in certain platforms
if rpm --quiet -q pam; then

var_password_pam_remember='<xccdf-1.2:sub xmlns:xccdf-1.2="http://checklists.nist.gov/xccdf/1.2" idref="xccdf_org.ssgproject.content_value_var_password_pam_remember" use="legacy"/>'
var_password_pam_remember_control_flag='<xccdf-1.2:sub xmlns:xccdf-1.2="http://checklists.nist.gov/xccdf/1.2" idref="xccdf_org.ssgproject.content_value_var_password_pam_remember_control_flag" use="legacy"/>'